New CA laws prohibit ICE from entering schools. How do they impact Fresno students?
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two bills meant to protect schools from being targets of federal immigration enforcement.
Assembly Bill 49, proposed by Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, D-Torrance, prohibits U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers from entering school sites and childcare facilities without presenting proper identification and judicial documents. The law also bars local education agencies from disclosing personal information about students, families, teachers, or school staff to immigration authorities.
Another piece of legislation, Senate Bill 98 by Senator Sasha Renée Pérez, D-Pasadena, requires schools to issue alerts if immigration enforcement authorities appear on campus, mirroring other warning systems put in place for campus emergencies.
Both bills took effect immediately upon signing, as they contained an emergency clause.
The new laws took effect as Fresno Unified and other districts across the state have already sought to implement measures to support immigrant students and their families amid the Trump administration’s mass deportation crackdown.
Fresno-area school districts told The Bee that they proactively implemented measures to support students and families facing immigration-related concerns as early as last November, following the presidential election.
Fresno Unified, the state’s third-largest school district with a nearly 70,000-student population, provided a series of resources, such as “Know Your Rights” sessions to families since late last year.
In January, the district’s governing board passed a resolution reaffirming Fresno Unified as a “safe space” against immigration enforcement, with the goal of restoring student attendance rates. The district also guaranteed families it would not ask for citizenship or immigration statuses, and dismissed a substitute teacher after an incident in February when the teacher questioned high schoolers in class about their resident cards.
“We have strong policies and protocols already in place to ensure our schools continue to be safe spaces where learning comes first,” said Fresno Unified spokesperson Diana Diaz. “If immigration enforcement were ever to impact our campuses, we are prepared to communicate swiftly and clearly with our staff and families to ensure they are informed and supported.”
Central Unified, which serves nearly 16,000 students in the southwest of Fresno, passed a board resolution in January to uphold its 2017 stance that “all children are entitled to a public education regardless of their immigration status.”
Clovis Unified spokesperson Kelly Avants told The Bee that the district does not collect information regarding students’ status and provides various kinds of support programs if a child is struggling for any reason.
“We are reviewing the details of the final versions of the bills signed by the Governor to ensure that our policies and procedures now in place remain consistent with the law,” Avants said. “Our initial review is that we won’t need to update any existing policies.”
Bryan Singh, Muratsuchi’s chief of staff, said in an email that while many school districts have taken proactive steps, the new laws prevent immigration agents from harassing or detaining students while on school grounds.
Singh said Muratsuchi introduced the bill after hearing that local school districts experienced attendance drops because of families’ deportation fears. A recent Stanford University study found a rise in Central Valley student absences following the January California Border Patrol raids in Kern County.
According to the Migration Policy Institute, 133,000 undocumented children between 3 and 17 years old are enrolled in California’s public schools and 750,000 K-12 students in California have an undocumented parent.
Fresno-area school district officials say attendance remains stable this school year, after the noticeable decrease due to deportation threats last year. School attendance is still recovering from the pandemic loss, as well.
Diaz, Fresno Unified’s spokesperson, told The Bee that attendance as of the fifth week of the school year was 93.4%, an increase of 0.1 percentage points compared to the same week last year. It fell 3 percentage points short of the pre-pandemic level recorded during the 2018-19 academic year.
Avants shared that Clovis Unified’s attendance for the current school year is 96.01%, compared to last year’s 94.85%.
